In a significant move to protect digital rights, the Supreme Court of India on Tuesday issued a stern warning to Meta Platforms Inc and WhatsApp, asserting that global tech giants cannot “play with the right to privacy of citizens in the name of data sharing.” The apex court’s observations came during a hearing on appeals filed by the companies against a ₹213.14 crore penalty imposed by the Competition Commission of India (CCI) for anti-competitive practices related to their privacy policy.
A three-judge bench, led by Chief Justice Surya Kant and including Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi, expressed deep concern over how user data is managed. The Chief Justice criticized the complexity of the companies’ privacy agreements, noting that the terms are often “so cleverly crafted” that they remain incomprehensible to the average citizen.
The bench did not mince words, describing certain data-sharing practices in sharp terms:
“This is a decent way of committing theft of private information, we will not allow you to do that… You have to give an undertaking otherwise, we have to pass an order,” the CJI remarked.
The court emphasized that the right to privacy is “zealously guarded” in India and warned that it would not permit even a “single word” of user data to be shared without proper safeguards.
The case reached the Supreme Court after Meta and WhatsApp challenged a judgment by the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT). The NCLAT had largely upheld the CCI’s earlier findings, which concluded that the tech giants had abused their dominant market position through their 2021 privacy policy update. While the NCLAT provided some limited relief regarding data sharing for advertising purposes, the core penalty and findings of dominance abuse remained.
The CCI had originally flagged that WhatsApp’s “take-it-or-leave-it” policy forced users to share data with other Meta-owned applications, thereby stifling competition and infringing on consumer choice.
Recognizing the broader implications for digital governance, the Supreme Court has ordered that the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) be made a party to the petitions. This ensures that the Union Government’s stance on data protection and IT regulations is factored into the final judicial determination.
The bench is scheduled to pass an interim order on February 9. In the meantime, the court has made it clear that the companies must provide a formal undertaking to protect user privacy or face a direct judicial mandate.
